In the tumultuous aftermath of Rudy Giuliani’s bombshell admission during an on-air interview with Sean Hannity that Trump not only knew about but paid the $130,000 to Stormy Daniels, all eyes turned to the president, who had previously told reporters that he had no knowledge of the payment.

According to The Washington Post’s Robert Costa, Trump was “very pleased” with Giuliani’s admission. Giuliani “says [he and Trump] discussed his revelation of the reimbursements long in advance. Does not expect to be fired. Insists his remarks on FNC [Fox News Channel] were approved by Trump.”

Giuliani tells me he just spoke w / POTUS. Tonight by phone. President "very pleased," Giuliani says. He says they discussed his revelation of the reimbursements long in advance. Does not expect to be fired. Insists his remarks on FNC were approved by Trump. Story TK.

Q: The president’s not angry with you? He was aware you’d bring it up?
A: “Oh, yeah, yeah. Sure, sure. He was well-aware that at some point when I saw the opportunity, I was going to get this over with.”
Q: You spoke about this w/ him in recent days?
A: “Probably 4 or 5 days ago"

In reality, Giuliani’s comments – that Trump and his lawyer, Michael Cohen, “funneled the [$130,000] through a law firm, and the president repaid it” – are tantamount to an admission of campaign finance law violation.

Giuliani says Trump's payment to Stormy Daniels was legal because it didn't come from campaign funds.

On Cohen, Giuliani says, "[Trump] knew he would take care of things like this — like I take care of this stuff with my clients, I don't burden them with every single thing." pic.twitter.com/ZFgjNtCbnY

“I certainly hope that what Rudy Giuliani is not suggesting is, is that in fact, the reimbursement took place over several months, in an effort to avoid triggering a $10,000 monetary requirement relating to payments; namely if they structured reimbursement payments.”

“Again, I don’t have any basis that they did. But that statement causes me grave concern. If they structured reimbursements in amounts less of than $10,000 in an effort to potentially avoid detection; that’s a serious, serious problem.”

“That’s called structuring. It’s a violation of federal law. It’s a criminal act…”

“It doesn’t make any sense why this reimbursement took place over several months, it doesn’t make any sense unless they were trying to avoid detection.”

Whether Giuliani’s claims are true – that he and Trump made a conscious decision to release this blatantly contradictory and possibly incriminating information on national television – remains to be seen. But regardless of their rosy spin, the optics of a White House in disarray certainly remain.